120: Chapter 120 Hermione Petrified

"Granger has been taken to the Hospital Wing."

Pansy brought the news into the Common Room, and the chatter by the fireplace instantly ceased.

Flint was in the middle of discussing the Heir of Slytherin clearing up trouble with Adrian Pucey when Draco's glare cut him off.

"Shut up."

Flint turned his head. "Malfoy, are you sad for that Mudblood?"

Draco grabbed a silver goblet and slammed it onto the table. "I told you to shut up. Do you want Professor Snape to hear you celebrating a student being attacked, or do you want the Board of Governors to receive testimony that upper-year Slytherins support the attacks?"

Adrian Pucey grabbed Flint. "Don't talk about this in the Common Room."

Flint bit his cheek and sat back down.

Zabini swirled a silver spoon. "Malfoy is actually thinking logically today."

Draco pulled at his collar. "I just don't want some idiot getting the whole House killed."

Allen sat in the corner, a Potion essay assigned by Snape spread out before him, his quill paused at the line asking whether space-stabilizing Potions exist.

Nott entered the room. "The Hospital Wing is sealed. Hermione Granger and Penelope Clearwater are confirmed Petrified. Granger was clutching a mirror and a page of information about the Basilisk. Potter and Weasley lost control of their emotions, Professor McGonagall took them away, and Professor Snape stayed at the scene to check for water traces."

Pansy sat down. "The girls are all crying over there. Gryffindor blames Harry, Hufflepuff says the Parseltongue summoned the monster, and Ravenclaw is worried about their Prefect."

Draco irritably pushed the silver goblet away. "She had clearly found the answer."

"Which is why she was removed from the chessboard."

Several people looked at Allen simultaneously.

Draco stared at him. "Allen, she almost died."

"She didn't die. She brought a mirror, left the information sheet, and the Professor knows about the Basilisk. She completed the most valuable step."

"You treat her like a tool? She's a student."

Allen closed his essay. "She is a student targeted by Tom. The faster she investigates, the easier it is for her to be eliminated. Would you have preferred I locked her in the Dungeon last night?"

Draco was choked for words but refused to back down. "At least you could have told the Professor in advance."

"With what excuse? That I know about the Basilisk from a diary I've never touched, or that I know the route from the spatial echoes of the Chamber of Secrets barrier?"

Allen raised his eyes to look at him. "The moment I speak, Snape will press me into the Headmasters Office, Dumbledore will pry into the source of my abilities, Lucius will hear from the Board of Governors that a branch of the Potters is involved with the Chamber of Secrets, and Tom will change targets. The Basilisk will still move."

Nott closed his notebook. "The chain of evidence is insufficient; exposing it is equivalent to exposing oneself."

Pansy looked at Draco. "And besides, Granger is alive."

Draco was silent for a long moment, then pushed the silver goblet further away. "I know you're right, but this whole thing stinks."

Zabini nodded. "The chessboard theory applied to living people is truly ugly."

Allen did not refute this.

He looked at the location of Hermione's attack on the pipe map, his finger resting on the edge of the ink circle.

Hermione was not a friend, nor an ally, but she was the light he had pushed to the front stage.

Tom had snuffed out that light early.

That was over the line.

"Nott, from now on, Ginny Weasley is the highest priority."

Nott's pen tip dropped.

"Meal times, missed classes, time spent in the lavatory, and time spent alone with the diary—record everything. Do not get close to her schoolbag, do not alert her, and do not let her discover she is being watched."

"Understood."

"Pansy, spread the word among the girls: don't go to the second floor at night, especially don't accompany first-year Gryffindor girls to talk about their troubles. Use Penelope as the reason."

"That's enough."

"Zabini, expedite the news on the Board of Governors. If Lucius pushes to remove Dumbledore, I need to know the date."

"I'll write a letter tonight."

Allen looked at Draco. "Don't you write a letter. Don't ask your father, don't mention the diary. You just need to continue being a Malfoy controlled by his father."

Draco stared at his own hands. "What if it really was my father who stuffed that thing to Ginny?"

"Then he will pay the bill."

"How will he pay?"

Allen folded up the pipe map. "By surviving the Chamber of Secrets first."

Outside the Hospital Wing, Harry and Ron sat on a bench. Madam Pomfrey would not allow them in, and Professor McGonagall would not allow them to linger, yet both remained at the door.

Ron clutched the mirror Hermione had dropped; a corner of the glass was cracked.

"She said she was going to check something and would be back soon."

Harry stared at the ground. "The diary gave me Hagrid to delay us."

Ron looked up. "You still have that thing?"

Harry took the black-covered diary out of his robes. "I want to ask it again."

Ron held down his hand. "Are you crazy? Hermione just ended up in there because of this."

"It knows about fifty years ago, and it knows about Tom."

"It's lying to you. Hermione said so—it's lying to you."

Harry did not refute him.

In the shadows of the corridor, Snape saw the diary in Harry's hand, and his expression darkened.

Professor McGonagall emerged from the Hospital Wing. "Potter, Weasley, return to the tower."

Harry stood up. "Professor, the entrance is in Myrtle's lavatory. Hermione found it."

McGonagall looked at Snape.

Snape stepped closer. "I will inform the Headmaster."

Ron asked urgently, "What about Professor Dumbledore?"

McGonagall's fingers tightened, and she did not answer immediately.

Snape took over. "The Headmaster is dealing with letters from the Board of Governors."

Harry's expression changed. "Now?"

McGonagall suppressed her anger. "Return to the tower. You are not allowed to act without authorization."

Harry shoved the diary back into his robes, a hard, stubborn look tightening in his eyes.

In the Dungeon, after Allen finished listening to the news Nott brought back, he wrote three lines on the parchment.

Harry still possesses the diary and is emotionally unstable.

Dumbledore is constrained by the Board of Governors.

Tom's next step: reclaim the diary or induce Harry to open the door.

Draco frowned. "The diary is in Harry's hands. How will Ginny get it back?"

"Steal it," Pansy said. "The girls' dormitory won't work, and the Common Room is difficult, but Harry carries it around."

Zabini continued, "Or make Ginny break down, inducing Harry to return the item to her."

Nott flipped through his notebook. "Ginny didn't come to dinner today. Percy looked for her but couldn't find her. Fred and George thought she was crying in her dormitory."

Allen stood up. "She is looking for the diary."

Inside the Portable Space, Void looked up. The golden-patterned map lit up with a thin line pointing toward the corridor outside Gryffindor Tower.

That was not the Basilisk; it was the diary's remnant soul pulling on its host.

Peter, having been released from his silence, immediately shouted, "Don't let the diary return to the girl's hands! Tom will be anxious if he loses the diary. Once he gets it back, he will feed even faster. Once the girl is drained, he will be able to come out, or at least be closer to a living person."

Allen looked at the cage. "First target after coming out?"

"Harry, or you."

Peter hugged his head. "The Master remembers you. Even if the Tom in the diary hasn't met you, there might be echoes between the soul fragments. That incident where you took the Killing Curse head-on—the remnant soul won't forget."

Draco couldn't see the Portable Space, only Allen standing motionless. "More news?"

Allen sealed Peter back up. "The diary cannot return to Ginny's hands."

Draco's eyes lit up slightly. "Then we snatch it?"

"Harry will treat anyone who steals his things as an enemy. Ron will shout, McGonagall will come, and Snape will catch us."

Draco sat back down. "Then what do we do?"

"Make Harry lose it himself."

Nott stopped writing. "Provoke him?"

"He is angry, guilty, and wants to prove that Hermione's accident wasn't in vain. As long as the diary responds, he will write. The more he writes, the better Tom can figure him out."

Allen placed the small round mirror on the table. "We need to make him realize that the diary is fishing for information."

Zabini tapped the edge of the table. "Who can convince him?"

Pansy said, "Hermione can't speak."

Nott looked at Allen. "Ron."

Allen nodded. "Ron fears things that can write, and he trusts Hermione."

Draco grimaced. "You want to pass messages through a Weasley? Who would he believe?"

"Percy."

The Common Room was silent for a moment.

Zabini laughed. "The Prefect brother: girlfriend Petrified, sister missing, younger brother clutching a dangerous diary. Percy will treat the rules like a lifeline now."

Pansy stood up. "I'll have the Ravenclaw girls pass the news to Percy that Penelope heard about the diary before the incident."

Nott added, "And add one more thing: Hermione suspected the diary could control people."

Draco looked at Allen. "You're even designing the Weasley Family's arguments."

Allen put away the mirror. "The more fiercely a family argues, the harder it is to hide the diary."

That night, the news in the Hospital Wing corridor shifted direction.

Some said Penelope heard Hermione mention the black diary before being attacked. Others said Hermione suspected the diary was showing Harry fake memories. Still others said Ginny Weasley had been looking for an old notebook lately and would cry when she couldn't find it.

Percy Weasley intercepted Harry in the Gryffindor Common Room.

"Give that diary to me."

Harry backed away. "Why should I?"

Ron stood between the two. "Harry, listen to him first."

"Before Penelope was attacked, Hermione was researching this diary. Ginny is also involved with it."

Percy reached out. "Give it to me; I will hand it over to Professor McGonagall."

Harry gripped his robes tightly. "Hermione said not to write in it alone. I didn't..."

Ron turned his head. "You wrote in it?"

Harry didn't speak.

Ron's face went pale. "Harry!"

The Common Room descended into chaos.

Ginny sat in the corner, her fingers gripping her skirt. Hearing the word 'diary', she was pulled to her feet.

The black-covered diary grew hot inside Harry's robes.

In the Dungeon, Allen sat in the center of the Portable Space, the golden-patterned map covering the floor beneath his feet.

Void coiled at the edge of the pipe map, silver eyes locked onto Gryffindor Tower.

Beside the ebony box, the cracked pocket watch's blue light pointed toward Harry, then shifted toward Ginny.

Allen wrote three lines on the parchment.

Hermione removed from the front stage.

The battle for the diary begins.

Monitor pipe movements 24/7.

He pressed down on the golden pattern on the north side. "Void, watch every inch of the waterways. If the Basilisk raises its head, wake me up."

Void's tail tip dropped.

Peter in the cage buried his face in his knees.

The sound of the Black Lake rolled past the windows of the Slytherin Dungeon, arguments erupted in Gryffindor Tower, and beneath the Second Floor Girls Lavatory, the sleeping giant serpent slithered past the stone pillars.

Allen closed his eyes, sleepiness unable to suppress the cold, hard anger in his chest.

"Tom, you took away my intelligence pusher."

The cracked pocket watch chimed softly.

"Next, it's my turn to take your lifeline."